About Astrology:
I recommend this fascinating book:
Religion and the Decline of Magic: Studies in Popular Beliefs in Sixteenth and Seventeenth-Century England (Penguin History) -- January 1, 2003, by Keith Thomas
https://amazon.com/Religion-Decline-Magic-Sixteenth-Seventeenth-Century/dp/0140137440/
The boundaries between medicine, astrology and astronomy were blurry at the start. Even the famous astronomer Johannes Kepler included some magical thinking in his scientific hypotheses. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johannes_Kepler
Kepler's His mother was an astrologist and herbal doctor named Katharina Kepler. We know that she introduced her son to astronomy. He, in turn, perhaps retained some of her magical thinking.
[A short song - about Kepler's mom]
Kepler had a wonderful mother, a healer and herbalist.
She woke her 6 year old son one night, with forehead that she kissed.
She took him to a high place to observe a piece of heaven
and there he saw the Great Comet of 1577.
Again, age nine, after night had fallen into his room she slips.
She leads him outside to see the moon, a lunar red eclipse.
Perhaps his mom is the one who later suggested the notion
that led her son to elliptical curves of planetary motion.
About Copernicus:
Although Copernicus was Polish, he received most of his college education in Italy. He studied astronomy under professor Domenico Maria Novara, University of Bologna in Italy, between 1496 and 1503. Professor Novara apparently had doubts about Ptolemy’s cosmology and told his students such. This is interesting to me because Galileo was also educated in Italy. I imagine that there was quiet support for the Copernican Heliocentric Model among university scientists in Italy for a long time before Galileo published his Dialogue in 1633. Just fun to remember: Copernicus had no telescope. The telescope/spyglass had not been invented yet; the spyglass was a product of the development of the lens. Copernicus’ famous published work entitled “De revolutionibus” (1543) was 6 volumes long. The first volume covered the basic heliocentric theory. The remaining 5 volumes contain the detailed proofs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolaus_Copernicus
A favorite book, suitable for adults and children: https://smile.amazon.com/Recentering-Universe-Radical-Theories-Copernicus/dp/0761358854/ref=sr_1_1
About the spherical shape of the Earth:
The first historical exploration to circumnavigate the Earth was made by Magellan’s Spanish expedition 1519-1522. Of the 270 original men on board five ships, only Captain Elcano with a crew of 17 survived to return to Spain. Magellan was killed by the indigenous people of the Philippines in 1521. One of the survivors of Magellan’s expedition was also among the four survivors of the world’s second circumnavigation expedition: it took 11 years to return home. These circumnavigations confirmed, definitively, that the Earth is round. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magellan%27s_circumnavigation
About the beginnings of Science Fiction:
The imagined “trip to the Moon” was a popular fictional theme in Galileo’s day. Ariosto’s epic poem “Orlando Furioso” includes a chapter “Astolfo’s Trip to the Moon.” This poem happens to also be Galileo’s favorite book; as a young man, he could recite long passages to entertain his friends.
Cyrano de Bergerac is considered the father of modern science fiction. He invented 6 ways to fly to the moon: (1) By holding bottles of dew - dew naturally ascending to the sun; (2) saltpeter in rocket fireworks attached to a homemade flying machine; (3) using mirrors and solar energy to generate bursts of hot air; (4) by adding smoke into a bottle; (5) by alternately throwing a magnet and an iron plate higher and higher; (6) by harnessing a flock of birds. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1424753.Voyage_dans_la_Lune
Johannes Kepler also has a connection to early science fiction writing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somnium_(novel)
About the importance of the Library:
In Galileo Revisited, I have tried to dramatize Galileo's conflict with the Church as a “war between libraries.” There’s the Inquisitor’s Library where the Cardinals and priests are defending the “kingdom of knowledge” against the invention of the printing press. And there’s Galileo’s library, lovingly preserved by the hands of his dearest friends with books that are the “foundation of knowledge and inquiry.”
These two libraries are themselves symbols of centuries of the “war against books; the war against knowledge.” [Reality Is Not What It Seems: The Journey to Quantum Gravity January 23, 2018
by Carlo Rovelli] https://smile.amazon.com/Reality-Not-What-Seems-Journey/dp/0735213933/ref=sr_1_1
Conservative Christians and Muslims had methodically destroyed “offending books” from ancient Greece and Rome. By 1453, these assaults had effectively suppressed and erased scientific advances for over 1,000 years. It was after the fall of Constantinople in 1453 that many previously unknown scientific books made their way to the West as Greek scholars sought safety. The Guttenberg printing press [1450] - combined with the rise of a postal service - created an information explosion and the people of Europe were finally able to read, in their native languages, scientific books that had miraculously escaped destruction.
Did John Milton really visit Galileo under house arrest?
Yes. https://www.theflorentine.net/2017/12/04/john-milton-florence-italy/
Coincidentally, both Galileo and Milton became blind during their lives. So it was meaningful to me to imagine each of them looking through the same telescope at the stars and heavens.
The invention of the lens is an important piece of this history.
The lens was a treasured object that people were secretive about during the Renaissance — secretive because many artists had figured out how to make amazingly realistic paintings using the lens. (See David Hockney’s book: Secret Knowledge (New and Expanded Edition): Rediscovering the Lost Techniques of the Old Masters, October 5, 2006). They didn’t want their patrons to know that they had a technical tool for portraiture.
From my reading of Hockney’s book, I believe there’s an interesting connection between Galileo and Caravaggio. They both used lenses (most likely) and they both could claim the patronage of members of the Del Monte family. In my imagination, General Del Monte is the person who supplied lenses to both of them. How else could Galileo have produced a superior spyglass in 1609 with only two weeks in his workshop? The lenses were probably handed to him by someone.
https://smile.amazon.com/Secret-Knowledge-New-Expanded-Rediscovering/dp/0142005126/ref=sr_1_8
About my fascination with all things astronomical:
[DP’s song]
I think about the stars up in the sky.
I think about the way they mystify.
They open my heart to infinity
and the infinitesimal - that's me.
When morning comes the stars all go bye bye.
They rest themselves until another night.
Astronomers wake up while we're in bed,
when stars are cast like diamonds overhead.
Nova, eclipse, black hole, spinning pairs,
planets wandering up-and-down the stairs,
the moon illuminated by the sun;
Earth -- which is the home of everyone.
I don't believe that Earth is flat or square,
(or that) giant pillars hold it in the air,
(or) above there is a crystal dome with doors
that open to let rain in when it pours.
I dream about the sky at the gym
(because) I pretend I'm flying when I swim,
for long ago on a summer afternoon
I once took a trip up to the moon.
(On July 20th 1969, Apollo 11 launched to space. I was 14 years old.)
[end of song]
